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How to preserve detail when downscaling scanned photos?Done. The effects are actually quite subtle here, other times Bicubic Smoother/Bicubic Sharper give more exaggerated results resulting in a subtle soft focus feel or an effect similar to the watercolour filter. And yes, I know I'm making a big thing out of something that's negligible most of the times.

How to preserve detail when downscaling scanned photos?Ah, a drum scanner. If only... :) I will keep your advice in mind if I ever have (what to me appears to be) infinite money on hand ;). Thanks! And though it's not "true" grain, scans at a lower resolution still won't be perfectly smooth, and this non-smoothness still will have a certain "character" that is notably different between different films. I'm trying to figure out how best to preserve that particular character. I think that's also a topic worth discussing, don't you agree?

Mar14

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How to preserve detail when downscaling scanned photos?Thanks for the advice, however, I'm sad to say it's based on assumptions that aren't true: even at the highest resolutions, the image won't consist of purely black or white pixels, but will be a grainy greyscale image (or even "colour" - sometimes you catch more tonality scanning BW negatives in colour). I have never heard of a scanner that actually does this - I think the scan DPI would need to be in the tens of thousands at least, which would require a ridiculously big sensor, precision motor and a built-in microscope. Probably not a sensible way to make a scanner.

Mar14

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How to preserve detail when downscaling scanned photos?Mostly HP5, pushed to 1600 ISO and developed in HC 110. It's probably heresy to abuse the film like that, but I like the results. Also, I have absolutely no idea what "dye clouds" and "precipitated silver" means (and google isn't helping much).